


Watching the World Crumble

by Celebi284



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, M/M, Suicide, World War III, Yamaguchi is kinda OOC with swearing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2016-01-04
Packaged: 2018-05-09 20:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5554379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celebi284/pseuds/Celebi284
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The distant whine of something falling through the air pulled him from his thoughts. With tears still streaming down his face he carefully worked his way to the window. The color drained from his face and his mouth fell into a silent scream as he saw a heavy object collide with the ground. In an instant the force and heat of the explosion knocked him off his feet.</p>
<p>Apocalypse AU where Yamaguchi is left to record what happens in his journals</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I've been thinking about doing an apocalypse AU for a while- so here it is! The first chapter doesn't involve Yamaguchi writing in his journal but most future ones will start with an entry from him (in first person) then switch to third person for the rest of the chapter. Also the rating right now isn't permanent, it may change it in the future so keep that in mind. Please enjoy!
> 
> 12/29 Update: I just fixed some stuff that was pointed out to me, sorry this was unbetad!

His ears were ringing and it felt like everything was too bright for Yamaguchi. He groaned and took in his position, the last he remembered was helping his mom clean and then he was knocked to his knees. Faintly, he could hear screaming and the harsh crumble of buildings. The sounds kept getting louder and louder. He was regaining most of his hearing. What he couldn’t hear though was the soft breathing of his mother or the gentle sound of her humming as she made her way around cleaning up the living room. Yamaguchi whipped his head around to find his mother. A choked gasp escaped him when the only trace of her he could find was an outstretched arm. Her body was crushed under a large chunk of rubble. He jumped to his feet, an action that made his head spin, and took a step toward where his mother’s body was. A sharp crack under his feet quickly made him rethink his plan. He roughly ran a hand through his shaggy hair.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuuuuuuuck.” Yamaguchi dropped to his knees, which the floor promptly protested against, and held his face in his hands. A loud sob racked his body and caused him to crumble further into himself. The distant whine of something falling through the air pulled him from his thoughts. With tears still streaming down his face he carefully worked his way to the window. The color drained from his face and his mouth fell into a silent scream as he saw a heavy object collide with the ground. In an instant the force and heat of the explosion knocked him off his feet. He could feel the scream rip through his chest when he could feel the skin of exposed face and arms bubble from the ungodly heat.

The hum of a plane overhead knocked him out of his shock. Yamaguchi struggled to his feet and stumbled into his room.

“I have to leave, holy shit this is actually happening. I need to get out.” Yamaguchi said and winced at the way it pulled at his burns. He groped around his room until he found a backpack and he quickly started to shove essentials into it. A couple extra pairs of clothes, a first aid kit, a pocket knife and some basic hygienic supplies. A quick glance around led him to his desk where he grabbed some pens and two leather bound journals his mother had given to him. She had hoped that writing out his troubles and worries would help with his anxiety. Yamaguchi shuffled around his room picking things he thought would be useful when the sound of screeching metal pulled him from his thoughts.

“Oh man I need to fucking go _now_!” He quickly slung the backpack over his shoulder and slipped into the once tidy living room. He glanced at the large piece of rubble near the kitchen entrance and sucked in a pained breath. He walked over carefully and made his way around the edge into the kitchen. He knew that he was short on time so Yamaguchi grabbed the can opener, a lighter and matches and as many cans of food he could fit into his bag. Turning back he edged himself back into the living room. He leaned over the rubble then kissed his fingertips and pressed them against it.

“I love you mom, rest in peace. I’ll come back if I can.” Yamaguchi stepped back and yanked the front door open. With a final look back he made his way down the hallway of the apartment building.

“This is officially the worst day ever to live on the top floor. God I hope the stairs are still in one piece.” Yamaguchi mumbled to himself. Another groan from the metal made him sprint for the stairs. He sent a silent prayer to whatever god was listening that the stairs were intact, the last thing he needed right now was to be stuck on the eighth floor. Yamaguchi made a mad dash down the stairs, clearing all eight floors in record time.

“Must be my lucking fucking day.” Yamaguchi spat bitterly. He ran out of the lobby and into the street. There was an eerie silence in the air when he realized that there were bodies strewn all over the road. He had to bite back the vomit that crawled up his throat from the sight. Many of the bodies were almost unrecognizable, covered in burns that made them seem more like animals caught in a forest fire than people. A few looked like they had fallen from above and Yamaguchi shivered at the thought of people trapped in their apartments.

He hiked his bag higher up his back and thought about what his next course of action would be. He needed to secure more supplies if he was going to survive, there was no way he would make it more than a few days without a sleeping bag and a tarp to keep rain off him. He was only a few blocks away from a superstore so he kept close to the buildings and started to make his way downtown.

He rounded the corner and was narrowly missed by a piece of falling debris. He quickly spun around and moved into the middle of the street after that, his only problem then was to avoid the carnage brought by the bombs. Most of the buildings were surprisingly intact he thought to himself. He flicked his eyes to the sky, no planes in sight, only large plumes of smoke and ash. Taking his gaze from the sky, Yamaguchi brought his focus back to the road he was walking on and picked up the pace once he saw the store he was looking for up ahead. His face fell when he saw that the building was half collapsed and appeared to be on fire.

“Shit. There’s no way the rest is going to hold up much longer, I need to hurry.” Yamaguchi took a deep breath and made his way over to the front entrance. He clicked his tongue when the doors didn’t open, he then picked up a small piece of rubble and broke the glass. Carefully he stepped through and tried to avoid as much of the debris on the ground as he could. He knew the camping supplies was near the back of the store so he pulled his shirt up over his mouth and nose and crouched near the ground. He didn’t need to inhale the fire’s smoke if he could help it. Slowly he began to pick his way through to the back.

 

Yamaguchi squeezed his way through two big pieces of what he suspected used to be the ceiling. He wiped his hand across his face to clear away the sweat that had collected there. The fire had made the inside unbearably hot and all he wanted to do was get out, but he had to get supplies. He looked around to see that a few of the aisles were leaning on each other at odd angles that wouldn’t hold for long. Yamaguchi crawled under a few and made sure to listen to how they creaked to avoid being caught under anything.

He had just poked his head out from a particularly tight squeeze and to see that he had found the camping aisle. He began to thank every god he could list that: 1) he even found the right aisle 2) it was not buried or on fire and 3) that it actually had what he needed. He made quick work of grabbing a modest tent, a survival sleeping bag and an emergency survival kit. Upon a second thought he grabbed a hunting knife and stuffed it in his pocket.

Yamaguchi grabbed a roll of cable and set about securing his new supplies to his bag. He was so focused on his work that he didn’t hear the sound of footsteps coming up behind him. A sniffle made his freeze, out of the corner of his eye he could see something rushing at him. His blood ran cold and before he could get the knife back out of his pocket a child attached their self to his leg.

“Hey! Hey mister you have to help, I can’t find my mommy and daddy and my big brother left to get help. There was a big crashing sound and then they-they-“ the little girl sobbed into his pants.

“Shhh c-come on now, don’t cry.” Yamaguchi crouched down beside her and took in her disheveled appearance. Her spikey orange hair went in all directions, her little dress was ripped in multiple places and there was dusk stuck to the wet tracks on her face. Yamaguchi’s heart clenched, he had no idea what to do. The popping sound of fire claiming another item upper his sense of urgency.

“We have to go, like, _now_ , or else you won’t be here for your brother when he comes back. Here carry one of these.” Yamaguchi roughly handed the girl a sleeping bag and took her hand. He slipped his bag onto his back and began to pull the girl with him back towards the front. He began to rush at the sounds of the building starting to give out. He could feel the fire getting closer as well, the heat made sweat bead at the base of his neck.

Yamaguchi kicked away a piece of fallen debris and pulled the girl with him to the front of the store. He threw his bag through the broken door and stepped through after it. He turned to help the girl through when a piercing yell cut through the roaring sound of fire.

“Natsu?! Natsu where are you??” A frightened male voice called from the back of the store. The girl, whom Yamaguchi assumed was Natsu pulled her hands from him.

“Shouyou!” Natsu’s face lit up with delight. She turned and ran back into the building.

“No! Wait- come back! It isn’t safe!” Yamaguchi screamed at Natsu’s disappearing figure. When she didn’t respond he huffed and began to go back through the door when the building groaned and he saw the ceiling start to sag. He felt the color drain from his face and he dived back out the door. The rest happened in what seemed like slow motion for Yamaguchi. A broken sound fell from his mouth when the rest of the building collapsed and sent a pillar of dust into the air.

Yamaguchi stumbled back and coughed up the dust that had gotten into his mouth. He could feel tear running down his face and he screamed, for his mother, for Natsu, for everyone. He ran and kicked a car in the parking lot.

“Fuck! I can’t do this, I-I can’t do it.” He scrubbed his hand over his face, the tears just didn’t stop. Distantly he could hear plane engines again. He whipped his head around looking for something, anything to get him away from the store. His eyes fell on a discarded bicycle near the edge of the road. He ran over and stood it upright, it was a little tall for him but it would have to work. He could hear the planes getting ever closer as he mounted the bike. Yamaguchi pushed off and pedaled as fast as he could, he had to get out of the city. He didn’t care where he went he just had to be anywhere but there.

He lost himself in his thoughts as he pedaled through the city, he saw the carnage all over again and avoided buildings that had fallen. He kept pedaling until he was outside of the city, free from the images of pain and death. From there he got off the road and headed toward a dense area of trees a few miles from the city. By the time he reached the edge the sun was setting, he needed to find a place to set up quickly. A short distance from the edge of the tree line he found a clearly and promptly dropped all his stuff and sat down. All the adrenaline had left his body and he could feel the aches and pains springing up all over. Lazily he rolled out his sleeping bag and curled up inside of it, he had no more energy left. Yamaguchi drifted into a dreamless sleep, oblivious to the sound of another bomb being dropped.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And back into the city he goes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello hello my lovelies! I lied to you last chapter, this one is not going to start with a journal entry. Sorry if anyone was looking forward to that, I did try to be a little more dynamic this chapter though. Please enjoy!
> 
> * This is not beta-ed *

Yamaguchi groaned and clutched his head when he came to. There was a silence that clung to the air, no birds chirping and no sound of squirrels scavenging for nuts. As far as he could tell, no more bombs were being dropped. He sat up and looked around, everything was as he left it the day before. Yamaguchi’s stomach growled at him and he flushed red even though he was alone.

“Well, now’s a good a time as ever to get up I guess. Not like I have any obligations.” Yamaguchi set to work rolling up his sleeping bag and gathering some wood and tinder to start a fire. He was pulling cans out of his bag when he realized he had made a vital mistake. In his hurried state the previous day he had forgotten to grab any water or even a bottle to collect water in.

“What a great way to start my day, I find out I’m going to die in the next few days if I don’t find water. Wonderful.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, “Guess I’m going back into town. I should grab some pots and pans if I see them too, I didn’t really think about how I was going to cook my food either.” He quickly thought up a plan, he laid tent out flat and emptied his backpack into it, save for his knife. Then he wrapped the tent around the supplies and used the cable to secure it to a tree nearby. Yamaguchi didn’t know who or what was in the forest and he hoped that keeping it off the ground would keep anything from going through it while he was gone.

Yamaguchi slipped his bag onto his back and grabbed the bike from where it had fallen in his sleep. He whistled while he walked to the edge of the woods and deadpanned when he saw how far from the city he was.

“Well no wonder my legs hurt so much, it’s so fucking far!” Yamaguchi shrieked. He had pedaled a good three miles out of the city to get to the woods. Reluctantly he got on the bike and headed back towards the city he was forced to flee.

 

Yamaguchi passed through the entrance to the city and had to stop. He stared, mouth agape, at what remained of the city he once called home. The bombs had all but leveled the city since his escape. He could see a few buildings with only a few floors that had withstood the onslaught but all the taller buildings were gone. He felt his heart lurch, he could really never return. His reality was now that of a nomad, he was alone. Yamaguchi ditched the bike near the entrance in favor of walking through the wreckage instead of trying to bike through it.

“Good God, you’d think the third World War went off here or something.” He stopped, “Wait, is this a new war? I mean no emergency personnel came. Did everyone get attacked like this? Why here? Why now? This sucks.” Yamaguchi picked his way through the rubble and his questions went unanswered. There wasn’t much left, he could see paper drifting around and dust covered everything. He felt his heart sink a little bit, if he couldn’t find water while he was here he had wasted a good bit of time and energy, energy that he wasn’t getting back since he hadn’t eaten. A groan escaped him and he sat down. He wished he had actually eaten before he had left for the city.

“I would kill for an all you can eat buffet right now. Or even McDonald's, I would kill for a _salad_ from McDonald's. That’s how desperate I am.” He looked up at the gloomy sky and watched the clouds swirl around. “Maybe if I just lay here and it rains I can catch it in my mouth and it’ll be okay.” Yamaguchi stated to himself. He then made a face and snorted at the outrageous idea.

Yamaguchi sat up and surveyed his surroundings. He could see a light flickering in the distance. The sun wasn’t out so it could only be one of two things: a light bulb or a flashlight. Either way, it meant the possibility of running into another survivor. He pulled his knife out and began to work his way towards the light as quietly as possible.

Yamaguchi lay flat against a piece of rubble, the light was just below him. He lay there listening, waiting to see if something was going to move. After fifteen minutes of silence, Yamaguchi slung his leg over the edge and dropped down. Before him was a small store, it had miraculously survived due to the way the buildings on either side of it had fallen almost to protect it. He glanced around, nothing but flattened buildings around him. He nodded to himself and stepped towards the door. It was slightly ajar, but he was sure that could be chalked up to damage to the building itself. Yamaguchi pulled the door open and took in the interior of the store, he figured it had been an Asian mart due to the décor and symbols used around the shop. What stopped him from stepping in through was the footprints on the floor, clearly outlined by the lack of dust.

Someone had been here since the buildings fell. Someone had been in the city recently. Yamaguchi wasn’t alone anymore. He stumbled back and the door shut with a heavy “thwack”. He spun around looking for signs of the other person. There was nothing. Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen the footprints lead back out the door. Yamaguchi glanced back at the door. Either they had left through another opening or they were still inside.

“Well, if they’re still here they sure as hell know _I’m_ here.” Yamaguchi grit and whipped out his knife. He ran up to the building and pressed his back to the brick siding and peered through the glass window, careful not to show more of himself than necessary. Not a thing stirred within the store. He deemed it was dine and flung the door open and then dived behind the cash register. All was still in the store.

Yamaguchi poked his head out from the behind the register and took in the store, from the new vantage point he could see the footprints leading to a back room. His grip on the knife tightened and he stood in a low crouch to approach the door. The closer he got, the less he wanted to be there. He stopped a foot form the door, he was shaking so hard that he almost dropped his knife. One step, and then two forward. He was at the door. Yamaguchi gulped and extended his hand towards the knob but stopped short in a cold sweat. He had a bad feeling about what was beyond the flimsy piece of wood. Before he could talk himself out of it he threw the door open.

He stood frozen in place at the scene before him. Yamaguchi staggered back and vomited, his stomach couldn’t take the gruesome suicide. In the room the other survivor had blown their brains onto the walls and ceiling with a shotgun. The powerful gun at point blank was enough to not only bathe the room in blood, but it left the person indistinguishable. Yamaguchi clutched his stomach and closed the door so he didn’t have to see the haunting scene anymore. The acrid taste of vomit was caught in his mouth so he grabbed a random drink from the shelf and chugged it wanting nothing more than to brush his teeth.

Yamaguchi looked down at the bottle that he held in his hand, it was green tea. He grabbed another and gargled it before spitting it on the floor. A quick glance around told him that he could get all kinds of supplies in the store. Deft hands seized more bottles of tea, multiple bags of rice and a small wok. He didn’t have much luck finding a pot so he stuffed a teapot in with his spoils instead. He could at least boil water in a teapot. As he walked down the aisles looking for more useful items he made sure to get utensils to eat and cook with. He swiped a container of salt on his way out and started the walk back to his bike. The tea had help hydrate him so he was feeling in slightly better spirits despite what he had just seen.

Upon arriving back at the entrance of the city Yamaguchi slid the bag off his back and sat on the ground. He pulled a bottle of tea out and sipped from it. His stomach growled at him, this time more aggressively than earlier. A groan scratched its way out of his throat when he stood up, his body already ached and he still had to ride back to his campsite. Grumbling to himself Yamaguchi started the long bike back to the woods.

Yamaguchi all but threw the bike down when he came upon his campsite. Within minutes he had the tent down from the tree and he was assessing what kinds of food he had. He turned the cans over in his hands and pulled one, a beef stew, out of the bunch. After some fumbling with the tinder and lighter he finally got the fire going. He wandered around the small clearing until he found two forked sticks and a long, sturdy one to make a cooking spit from. After he fashioned one, Yamaguchi opened the can of stew and poured in into the teapot and placed it over the fire. While it cooked he set up the tent and placed his belongings inside of it. Once done arranging the items he pulled out a journal and began to write as the sun went down behind the trees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always please let me know what you think! Thanks for reading.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading and please leave a comment about what you liked/didn't like or anything I could improve on. Thanks again!


End file.
